Work Begins On Strategic Plan for ECC

East Central College President Jon Bauer hopes to have a strategic plan in place for the institution early next year.

The strategic plan is a road map that will guide the college through the process of achieving its long-term goals.

Bauer met last week with faculty and staff and assigned people to nine committees to help develop the plan.

Committees will write goals for different categories related to higher education, including helping students learn, accomplishing other distinctive objectives, understanding students and other stakeholders’ needs, valuing people, leading and communicating, supporting institutional operations, measuring effectiveness, planning continuous improvement and building collaborative relationships.

Bauer told committee members to meet and form objectives to support each of the goals, then develop strategies to meet the objectives.

Finally, each committee should outline the measures that reflect the progress and/or success of the strategy.

Ideally, the groups should be able to wrap up their work in October so all nine groups can come together later in October to review it, Bauer said.

He would like the new mission and vision statements adopted by the board of trustees before the end of 2013, and have the strategic plan in place by February because ECC’s goals will be tied to the budget and staffing.